Belfast west

Clonard Remembers

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“Is cuimhin linn.” Last week saw a series of events, organised by the Belfast 1969 Pogroms Commemoration Committee, in Clonard, Falls, and Ardoyne, including a photographic exhibition, documentary screenings, panel discussions, a play, a mass, and murals (Irish News), including The Pogrom Of August 1969 and the one above, in Bombay Street, which used to run between the Shankill and Falls but after the riots and burnings of August 1969 was split in two by a so-called “peace” line (see the wide shot, below).

“These are terrible days … but some good has already come from these attacks on our communities. You have young people and elderly people all closely knit together and that is a grand thing. We must not allow hatred to spring up in our hearts. For what we are aiming for now is justice. We demand justice. We are not begging for it – we are demanding it. It is our right and we will keep on demanding it until we get it. We don’t ask for anything more – just a fair deal … that we will soon have a community where everybody, irrespective of religious belief or irrespective of political ideology will be able to lead a normal life and will not be unjustly discriminated against.” – Fr Patrick Egan, sermon in Clonard Monastery, August 1969 (youtube).

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Copyright © 2019 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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We Have Hit Five

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The Westrock bungalows were aluminium prefab houses built in 1949 during the post-war housing shortage next to Springhill and Ballymurphy. British troops fired on the area from the high position of Corry’s timber yard in the summer of 1972; their bullets could go through the walls. Five people were shot dead, including a priest. The plaques shown are new additions to the memorial garden in Westrock Drive.

“On the evening of July 9th 1972 British marksmen mounted an unprovoked and sustained attack on this community. Among the snipers[‘] victims lay five dead. Gunned down during efforts to bring aid an succour to the wounded. Still waiting for justice to their memory and for freedom of the truth.”

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The Pogrom Of August 1969

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This August marks the 50th anniversary of what are euphemistically called “The Troubles”. The Battle Of The Bogside (Derry) began on August 12th; in Belfast, fighting began on the night of August 14th and before dawn three people in the Divis Street area were dead: Protestant Herbert Roy and Catholics Patrick Rooney and Hugh McCabe, both shot in the Divis flats complex by the RUC’s Shorland armoured cars. (Two other Catholics were killed in rioting in Ardoyne.) This new board is on Divis tower, next to the plaque commemorating Rooney and McCabe.

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Copyright © 2019 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X06744 X06745 “Ar eagla go ndéanfadh muıd dearmad” [for fear we would forget/lest we forget] “erected by the falls commemoration committee” ‘time for truth” “malone road fiddles”  “barricades stay until demands are met”

Active Service

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“In memory of IRA volunteers Gerard Crossan, Tom McCann, Tony Lewis, John [Sean] Johnston, who died while on active service on the 9th March 1972 at 32 Clonard St. Erected by the Greater Clonard Ex-Prisoners Association.” The four died in a premature explosion (“active service”) presumably at the home of Lewis, who lived in Clonard Street. Crossan and Johnston were 19, McCann and Lewis were 20 (The Troubles 11).

Clonard Street, Belfast.

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Another World

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In addition to inking tattoos at Shankill Road’s Cusick Tattoos (tw | Fb | ig), Kamil Lodynski (Cultivar) painted the electrical box out front.

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Groves – Reilly Corner

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“Coırnéal Groves Reilly”. Throughout the Troubles the junction of the Glen and Falls Road was home to an intensely fortified RUC barracks. The barracks was demolished in 2005 and gradually redeveloped over the years. In January (2019) it was renamed in honour of activists Emma Groves and Clara Reilly who campaigned for decades against plastic bullets (Groves was blinded in 1972 by a plastic bullet fire by a Paratrooper) and founder members of Relatives For Justice (web). For images from the launch, see Irish Examiner.

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Light Of The World

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Disney character Lumière (from Beauty And The Beast) is joined by bobble-head Pope Francis and bobble-head Jesus on the dashboard of a van parked on the (Protestant) Shankill Road.

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In The Heart Of This Vibrant City

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“Gardiner Square” will be a new development at the junction of Gardiner and N King streets, where a Union Flag now flies. The promotional materials for the development tout Belfast’s business potential and promise that  it is a “short walk” to the “highly anticipated Tribeca Project“. It’s not clear whether the flag will still be flying when the units open. (See previously: the plethora of UVF boards in the Village in response to the on-going redevelopment of the Village (from 2012 to the present).

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Morpeth Street, Ulster

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The “Ulster” street sign is partially obscured by all of the streamers but the decorations leave no doubt as to the allegiance of this householder to the UK.

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Welcome To The Shankill Road

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This is the new ‘Welcome To The Shankill (Road)’ mural in Gardiner Street, which replaces the one that had been there since (at least) 2009 (see Welcome To The Shankill).

The mural is a version of the old Beverley Street ‘welcome’ mural (by Blaze FX), with the same four panels (parades/bonfire, blitz, sports, murals) and the same three hands. But instead of “Proud, Defiant, Welcoming” we now have “Proud, Resilient, Welcoming”. (I Am Not Resilient in the lower Shankill complains that the word is used to justify neglect and/or maltreatment.)

It escaped no one’s notice that, although the number of languages expressing a greeting is now much greater than the original ten, Irish is not included among them. Also Ulstèr Scots. (Also French, for some reason. Polish is included – “Witamy”). (See similarly “No Irish” in the lower Shankill estate but also All Flags Are Welcome in Divis, which omitted the Union Flag.)

The claim that the Shankill area dates back to AD 455 is used in The Original Belfast. The claim was made by the Greater Shankill Partnership.

Despite the appearance of bricks, the main panel is not in fact a mural but a board.

Held over from the old mural are the two strips of ‘famous faces’ on the left and right (see below).

Images of the July 10th launch from sponsors Alternatives.

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X06703 X06704 X06705 SignLink NI with local youth; norman whiteside baroness may blood william conor henry montgomery wayne mccullough jimm wornock james cunningham johnny mcquade